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The Dumbing Down of U.S. Intelligence

The Patriot Act, up for reauthorization, needs to be modernized and strengthened, not watered down.

By

L. Gordon Crovitz

May 10, 2015 7:25 p.m. ET

FBI Director James Comey warned last week that the American Islamists who tried to assassinate free-speech advocates at a cartoon exhibition near Dallas are not alone. There are “hundreds, maybe thousands” of potential terrorists in the U.S. being inspired by overseas groups. “The haystack is the entire country,” he said. “We are looking for the needles, but increasingly the needles are unavailable to us.”

The needles will be even harder to find if Congress weakens the Patriot Act by reducing the intelligence available to...